Larne chase another 'pinch yourself' Euro moment

Haveron is close to leading Larne to the Uefa Conference League for the second time in three seasons [Getty Images]

Larne manager Gary Haveron says he is keen to experience another "pinch yourself" moment by leading the club back to the league phase of the Uefa Conference League.

Having managed three of Larne's games during their Conference League debut in 2024-25, Haveron is hoping to guide the Inver Park club back to a major European stage after reclaiming the Irish Premiership title earlier this year.

Larne hold a 2-0 aggregate lead over Gibraltar's Lincoln Red Imps heading into Thursday night's play-off second leg at Inver Park.

"It's what you live for. The nights down here, I look back to when we played the Imps here two years ago when we got to the group stages and it was something that will live long in the memory for me, up there with my best night in football."

The 45-year-old former defender added: "To be on the cusp of potentially doing it again, it's a pinch yourself moment and it's a credit to the players that we're back in this position."

Late Paul O'Neill and Kevin O'Hara goals in last week's first leg have put Larne in command of the tie as they chase qualification and the £2.7m reward that comes with it.

However, Haveron insists Celtic's Champions League play-off capitulation this week serves as an important reminder of the need for his players to guard against complacency.

"We have to approach it like we approach every game at Inver Park," added Haveron.

"We can't be any other way. It's not in our mindset to sit in and nullify, we're at our best when we're on the ball and getting after teams. That'll be the gameplan.

"Imps have our utmost respect, they're a really good team so we know difficult it'll be but we have to try and impose our gameplan on them and try and take advantage of being in front of our home crowd who will get behind us every minute of the game."

'We're in a better position'

Having beaten the Imps in a play-off in 2024 to reach the main group or league stage of a major European competition for the first time, Larne lost five of their six Conference League games to finish 34th out of 36 teams.

Their European commitments also created a domestic fixture backlog and they ultimately finished 22 points behind Linfield before bouncing back to clinch their third league title last season.

And Haveron insists Larne are "for sure" better prepared for another crack at the Conference League than they were two years ago.

"We are in a better position because we've learned a lot from what we've done previously," he said.

"But there's still learning to be done and we want to continue to learn in Europe from being there."

Haveron added: "This is our 38th [European] game in the past six years. That's a wealth of experience we've picked up and we've learned lessons along the way.

"We've been beaten in games, we've had tight games and we've won quite a few as well so to have that many games in that space of time shows how well Larne have competed in Europe."

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